


You and Me and School and Ghosts... Normal Stuff

by IAmWhelmed



Series: Betrayal [3]
Category: Paranatural (Webcomic)
Genre: Adventure, Comedy, F/M, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-26
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-03-19 16:24:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3616437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IAmWhelmed/pseuds/IAmWhelmed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The lives and memories of the Activity Club in non-chronological order. Everything takes place between "Flooded" and "Commitment Issues".</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You Know What This Corner Store Needs? Destruction.

8th Grade  
“Oh… crap.” Max breathed and rubbed his head, looking around the corner store- or, what was left of it. Shelves were tossed over and bags upon bags of chips and other goodies lay smashed and crushed on the floor. He was almost scared to move from his spot as there was shattered glass everywhere, and he already was pretty sure he had a few pieces in his arm.

From where he sat near the freezer, Isaac was across the way. The medium stood in one place, jaw slowly dropping the longer he glanced around the room and the more it began to sink in.  
The corner store was destroyed and the reality of the situation was starting to weigh heavily on Max’s shoulders.

“OH MY GOD, ISAAC! WHAT DO WE DO?!” Max stood and began screaming, hands on either side of his head. His baseball cap was long forgotten somewhere in the corner store (and he was not about to look for it in the chance that a wall may collapse should he try to move much of anything).

“I DON’T KNOW!” Isaac leaned back against the window, one hand pressed to his forehead, either in an attempt to wipe the sweat from his forehead or slow the spinning that was wrecking his mind. Whatever the case, it didn’t settle Max’s heart at all. They looked left, then right, then left again, then finally at each-other. Their hands fell limply at their sides.

“AH!”

“AH!”

They began screaming at each-other, not entirely sure what they were trying to accomplish.

“AH!”

“AH!”

“STOP!” Max extended his arms and waved them back and forth like a fan. Isaac stopped screaming at the command, instead pausing to pant and crouch down until he caught his breathe. “Okay. My Dad is going to be home in one hour. I think…” Max placed his hands on his hips and glanced from side to side. “I think we can fix all of this by the time he gets home!”

The entire counter fell with a cloud of smoke, sending the cash register straight to the floor with a ‘clank’ and the accompanying sound of it popping open. A few dollars flew in the smoke, dissipating Max’s false sense of hope and security. His shoulder fell just like all of his hopes and dreams. “Okay well I’m thinking we climb the tree up to the roof then we just jump- go ahead and jump! Quick and painless, ya feel me?”

Isaac exhaled, rolled his eyes, and slapped the back of Max’s knee. “We need to be smart about this. Let’s stop for a few moments and think.” He’d sobered from his breakdown with an amazing quickness about him. Max must have been freaking out enough for the both of them. “Is there any way we can replace all of this before your dad gets home?”

Max frowned and thought for a good long while, leaving Isaac to kick up some dirt and think their situation through. Nothing particularly normal ever happened to the Activity Club. That wasn’t to say they were annoyed by their constant battles against mischievous spirits- just that they weren’t surprised when one came knocking on their front door- or more literally, the entire corner store Max’s family lived in. The day’s surprise had been an obnoxiously hyper and hungry spirit- a fox spirit with ears the size of two aisles- and yet they’d still only noticed its presence once they heard a shelf fall. The chase had been more or less exhausting and probably not worth all of the damage it dealt. In the end, the fox spirit trotted out of the store like a Pomeranian Lapdog with a diamond-studded collar on its neck, leaving them in the shambles that was Max’s home. “I mean, we have an entire new stock in the back anyway, but still!” Max turned his arm to get as close a look as he could to his elbow. With hesitance, he tried to pull some of the glass out of his arm, wincing when he realized he’d definitely need pliers. Isaac nodded and carefully stepped over the pile of glass he’d (luckily) landed next to and not on top of. The spirit had nasty hind legs- that was for sure.

Eventually he found his way to the door that led to the storage room. Isaac held his hand out, opening and closing his hand to gesture for the keys. Max groaned as he gave up on another piece of glass and tossed it Isaac’s way. Isaac caught the set easily and went to stick it in the door- only to realize there were like ten.

“What the-? Max, your dad has one corner store, right?”

In the time it took for Isaac to realize opening a door was more difficult a task than it’d sounded, Max had somehow gotten one leg over his neck and was hopping in place (a little too closely to the pile of glass on the floor to be safe). Hearing his name, Max glanced away from his awkwardly-bent elbow and turned (tried to turn) to look at his friend. Isaac would have laughed had he not been so incredibly annoyed by the plethora of keys in his hands. “Oh, uh, yeah. Those are the keys to our bathrooms, bedrooms, the storage room, and a key for the kitchen.”

“The kitchen?! Why do you need a key for the KITCHEN?!”

Max shrugged (as much as he could with his own leg over his shoulder) and hopped a little closer, trying desperately to get away from the glass that he was threatening to fall into, eyes wide and a drop of sweat rolling down his head. “I don’t know!”

“MAX!”

“OKAY IT’S BECAUSE I SLEEPWALK AND OCCASIONALLY EAT ALL OF THE DAIRY PRODUCTS.”

“MAX I DON’T CARE JUST TELL ME WHICH IS THE STORAGE ROOM KEY!”

“I DON’T KNOW! JUST TRY ALL OF THEM!”

Isaac irritatingly tossed the keys in the air and fumbled with them as he looked Max straight in the eyes, trying to make a point. “We don’t exactly have enough time for me to do that!”

“Well you have enough time to argue with me about it!”

Isaac screamed and started shoving keys as fast as he could into the keyhole while Max unhooked his leg from its position.

First key was a letdown.

Second key was no better than the first.

Third key was just right.

Fourth key- wait!

Isaac yelped and fiddled around until he found the third key again- only to drop the entire chain and lose it again. Max sucked in his cheeks and grabbed the broom, attempting to pick up as much glass as he possibly could while Isaac tried desperately to pick the keys up. Much to their disdain, the glass was not coming up easily and Isaac continued dropping the keys every time he picked them up.

Max groaned and tossed the broom at Isaac’s head, hitting the ginger and sending his face into the door. He nearly laughed at the short cry of pain he heard from his friend, but quickly sobered up when he remembered the intensity of the situation. “That’s it! Switch! You sweep the floor and I’ll find the dang key!”

Max’s hands were much steadier with speed. He found the right key in seconds and managed to unlock the door without any further problems- until the door got stuck. Max pushed once. He pushed twice. He pushed a third time with as much strength as he could muster, but alas the door wouldn’t come unstuck. The corners of Max’s lips twitched downwards as he jiggled the knob repeatedly.

“Um, Isaac we have a- HOLY COW HOW DID YOU DO THAT?!”

Isaac stood in the middle of the store, glass swept away neatly and the dust and debris cleared away, leaving the floor shiny and clean. “What?” Max spread his arms and motioned to the entirety of the floor, to which Isaac shrugged and made a cloud in his other hand. “Wind powers, duh.”

“I forgot you had those.”

“Yeah.”

Max turned towards the door and started trying to push against it. Every time he felt like he was getting somewhere, his shoes would slide against the tile of the floor and send him drifting downwards with no break. “The door’s jammed. I can’t get it open.”  
“I’m assuming you don’t want it broken?”

“You’d be right to assume that, yes!”

There was the faint sound of one of Isaac’s clouds fading away.

 

Almost ten minutes passed and the combined weight of the two spectrals had done nothing to the door. The wooden barrier stood true and strong. Max vaguely wondered how there wasn’t a scratch on it, considering he was sure himself and Isaac were covered in splinters.

Exhausted, the two pulled away and sat on the floor, panting and giving the door dirty looks between breathes. “Max,” Isaac sighed “I think we need to just take the thing down. We’ll say a couple of hooligans smashed the freezer doors and the door to the storage room and we’ll be fine.”

Even with the lack of air in his lungs, Max managed to laugh. “Did you just use the words hooligans unironically?”

Isaac opened his mouth to retort, realized he had indeed used the word ‘hooligan’s unironically, and promptly shut his mouth. “Shut up.”

“You are such an old man!”

“Max, am I shooting the door down or not?!”

“No!”

“So what are we going to do?”

“Sit here and hope our inevitable death is soon upon us- preferably upon us” Max checked his watch “in less than thirty minutes.”

Isaac saw Max’s face fall, but he knew it wasn’t anything compared to what his face would look like when his father got home and discovered his dream store had been trashed. His own heart plummeted at the thought. Mister Puckett was a great man- a bit childish to be a father- but a great man nevertheless. There had to be something they could do, if not to save Max’s dad the stress, but Max the guilt.

“Look” he sighed “maybe there’s something else we can do? I don’t know, some window in the back we can climb in and out of?”

Max shook his head and leaned back with his palms pressed flat against the tile floor. His cap hid his eyes for the most part, but Isaac could see how defeated he looked. He couldn’t blame him. Disappointing a parent was a horrible feeling- one Isaac knew well. While he doubted there was ever a time Max’s parents were disappointed in him, he didn’t doubt that some sense of shame lingered with Max without an outside source. “If that door doesn’t open, there’s no getting in there. But if we smash it open, it’ll cost my dad a fortune to fix- added onto the shattered glass and everything.”

Everything was messed up. His dad would be home any minute and he couldn’t do anything to fix up the store even a little. His dad would come home and either sit on his bed for hours contemplating his life choices or weep for a good day before finally getting anything done- after he jumped the hurdle of losing faith in the fresh start he’d hoped for. Max growled in frustration and grabbed the nearest thing, which happened to be a bag of marshmallows. With as much energy as he had left in him, he tossed it at the storage room door.

Much to their surprise, the wooden door opened as soon as the bag made an impact, slamming against the wall to its side. The spectral’s jaws dropped slowly at first, then all at once their mouths were wide open.

“Are” Max’s eye twitched “you” he clenched his fists “serious?!” He spread his arms wide, voice echoing in the otherwise empty store.

 

“Why did we think this was a good idea?!” Isaac’s hand was outstretched behind them as they flew around the corner store, his wind sending them soring. On occasion they could feel the scooter lift up just a few inches, but the movement would still make their hearts jump. Max’s hand tightened around the handles of their ride while his other hand stacked boxes and bags and cans on shelves, just as Isaac’s free arm tightened around his waist. “Dad’s gonna get here any second! We’ve gotta hurry!”

“So this is the best option?!”

“Do you have a better idea?!”

“You mean one that wouldn’t potentially send our heads through a concrete wall?!”

“Yes!”

“No!”

“Then shut up!”

They came to the end of the aisle and Max made a sharp turn- sharp enough that they were riding tipped to the side for a good portion of the following lane. Isaac screeched and slowed the stream of wind for only a moment. When he realized his reaction was doing more harm than good by making them unbalanced, he sent an even stronger gust out of his palm. Max yelped at the change, but tossed pretzels and candies and sunglasses and bottles of glitter all the same.

They didn’t hear the sliding doors open or the shuffling of plastic bags and content humming. Max’s dad stepped through the threshold with tons upon tons of souvenirs in either hand. He tilted his head to the music he was humming, eyes shut as he embraced the smell of home. “Oh, son! I’m home!” A flash of color sped by him fast enough to spin him around. “Whoa!” Just as his butt hit the ground, he heard the screeching of wheels and what sounded like muffled cries from two boys.  
When Max’s dad opened his eyes, he was met with the sight of Max kicking something away, successfully hiding it from sight. Both boys stood beside each-other, hand folded almost mysteriously behind their backs with smiles as wide and freaky as some of the cosplayers he’d seen at the comic convention. The parent sat up and rubbed his sore buttocks, eyebrows raised in surprise. “Isaac! It’s nice to see you came to visit!” He glanced around their home with curious eyes, looking for a sign of whatever it might have been that was making the boys act so strangely. “Em, what did you two do while I was gone?”

“We cleaned the corner store-!”

“We tidied up the shelves-!”

They answered simultaneously, both looking at the other with a fear in their eyes. Max rubbed the back of his neck and shrugged. “We cleaned the store and fixed the shelves!”

“Oh, how nice of you boys!” As he went to stand, Isaac and Max shot each-other relieved glances, exhaling the air they’d been holding. “That must have been hard work, too! How would you boys like to share some of the ramen noodles I brought home? They’re mystery flavored!”

“They have mystery flavors of ramen? That’s a thing they make?” Isaac’s eye twitched and Max’s face went slightly green, a hand flying to his mouth. “No, I just can’t read the labels so I have no idea what flavor any of these are!”

Max’s father disappeared up the stairs, leaving Max and Isaac to wallow in pride. “I can’t believe we just did that!”

“That was so awesome, man!”

“You were so cool!”

“Me? You’re the reason we broke the sound barrier! Without you, that would have been impossible!”

“Impossible? Max, you’re the one who had sick accuracy! I nearly sent us toppling over like ten times!”

The two sat and gushed over what they’d done for a long time (maybe ten minutes) before Max sighed and wrapped an arm around Isaac. While he was surprised at first, Isaac grinned ear-to-ear and returned the hug full-force, squeezing Max’s shoulders. “Seriously, Sparky. I couldn’t have done this without you. Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it, Max.”

The two pulled away and followed Max’s dad upstairs, kind of nervous about the ramen but not scared enough to reject it.

“So how long until he sees the glass is broken?”

“A week.”

“A full week?”

Max returned Isaac’s skeptical look with a cynical one.


	2. She Had a Heart With Blood She Didn't Want

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Max is curious about Cindy. Over a year of knowing her and nobody in the activity club really knew a thing about her- not even Ed. He takes advantage of a lapse in paranatural activity to ask her a few questions.

8th Grade

 

“Hey Cindy, can I ask you a question?”

Cindy paused with a large pretzel stuffed into her mouth. Max nearly laughed, but held it back for her sake. He was not about to tell her she looked like a dog with a stick in its mouth. That was too mean and as funny as it was he was not ‘that guy’. She seemed to realize it on her own, though, because her eyes widened and she nearly choked on the huge piece she bit off, rushing herself to finish it.

After she punched her own chest a few times and coughed on the salt, Cindy took a deep breath and asked “what do you want to know, Max?”

They walked alone the boardwalk with the business and atmosphere of the Mayview fair surrounding them. Isabel was filling balloons with water at a horrifyingly rapid pace, leaving the carny that stood behind the counter sweating under his (fake?) moustache. Ed was participating in the pie-eating contest- and winning, by the looks of it. Blueberry filling was everywhere. It was on the tablecloth. It was on the ground. The filling even hit some poor child square in the eyes. Isaac was in the bathroom (where they were, nobody had any idea) and Spender got lost an hour ago. They didn’t know where he went. That said, Max and Cindy were alone and he was itching to ask a few questions. It’d nearly been a year since they’d become familiar with her, and yet hardly any of them knew anything about her- interests, friends, enemies, dreams, fears... Even Ed couldn’t answer a lot of questions about her.

Max thought for a few seconds about what he wanted to ask. There were lots of things, but he kept drawing a blank. So many were on the tip of his tongue but he couldn’t seem to get the words out. What was her family like? He’d heard the story from Ed and Isabel, but he figured Cindy could explain her parent’s behaviors better than either of the other two could. What were her grades in school? That was too much. What was her first memory as a child? What about her most embarrassing moment?  
“Let’s start off simple. What’s your birthday?” He figured he’d ask the bigger questions a little later- how’d she get her tool? Where are Ed’s parents and has she met them? He didn’t know exactly where her boundaries were and he was not about to go jumping over any lines. Not yet. He wasn’t even sure if it would be him to cross them. Ed and Isabel were probably in a better position to ask things like that. He and Cindy had talked alone maybe three times in the year he’d known of her existence.

“Saint Patrick’s Day.”

“Wait, really?!”

Cindy nodded, lips stretching into a huge smile. “Yep, Saint Patty’s Day!”

“That’s… oddly fitting… what with green and all.”

She got him a quick glare, but glanced away before she thought he could tell. He made a note of the boundary he was clearly not allowed to break just yet. “Any other questions?”

Max thought, munching on his cotton candy as he searched through the files in his head. “What do you do for fun?” When it came around to the holidays, nobody had any clue what to get her, so that seemed as good a question to ask as any. They’d ended up pitching in to get her a book about martial arts- Isabel’s idea. While Cindy seemed eternally grateful for the gift (she nearly squeezed the life out of them and finished the book around three days after she got it), it was probably a good idea to know what she would actually want.

Cindy shrugged and took a small bite of her pretzel.

“I don’t know… work on my spectral talents?” Max gave her a look and she smiled sheepishly once the bite was gone. “I mean, I guess I like dancing, but besides that-!”

“Dancing, huh? Are you any good at it?”

“Pfft, it’s like the only thing I know how to do, really.”

“Wait, I thought you were good at math?” Cindy winced and swayed back and forth on her heels. “I’m okay at math, but I’m not great at it in any meaning of the word.”

“You’re on the math team!”

“Max, have you seen our math team? None of us really know what we’re doing.”

“Wait, nobody on the math team knows how to do math?”

“None of us have any idea what the heck a scalene triangle is.”

“Okay… that’s disappointing.”

That hadn’t helped much, considering ‘dancing’ didn’t have a huge market for gifts. He guessed they could get her a CD or something? Max tore off another piece of cotton candy and tossed it into his mouth, waiting for it to melt on his tongue before swallowing it. “So, about your tool?”

Cindy smiled and skimmed Max over from the corner of her eye. “You wanna know about my spirit!”

“Kinda sorta?” Max’s face dropped “Tell me everything I’m really curious and I want to know” it was with a deadpan expression that he said it, eyes widened in attentiveness. “Okay, okay I’ll tell you!” She giggled and lightly pushed him away with a hand to his chest. “My spirit’s kind of a chef.”

“A chef? But…” He pointed at her cellphone. “It’s... it’s in a phone!”

Cindy cocked an eyebrow at Max. “And what’s your point?”

“Don’t spirits just somehow, someway find a tool that has something to do with their abilities?”

He frowned when she snorted at him. “That’s not how that works.”

“Oh good, the world makes sense again.”

“Drop the sarcasm, you dork.”

“It’s a part of me, I can’t help it!”

She whacked him upside the head.

As soon as Max was done complaining about the bump he was probably sporting, Cindy continued on with the conversation, taking another small bite of the pretzel. “Here’s how it went: my spirit wandered into my house, attacked Mister Bluett in the kitchen, lost the fight, then hurried to find its way to a tool to inhabit. Unfortunately, it mistook my cellphone for a knife and-!”

“How did it mistake your cellphone for a knife?!”

“I don’t know. They’re not very smart, I guess. Maybe thought my phone was an electric knife?”

“Do they even know what electricity is?”

“I don’t know and I also don’t care.”

Max’s lips tightened, lost in his own head. There was dead silence for a few minutes. The two of them glanced around awkwardly; avoiding eye-contact when there was nothing to say.  
“So I take it this means you can cook?”

Cindy choked on another bite of her pretzel. In fright, she grasped her throat and coughed violently. She could feel the salt inching down the wrong hole bit by bit. Max jumped into action and hit her back, trying desperately to help her swallow the snack. Once Cindy gulped it down the right hole, she took a deep breath and bent over, hands on her knees. She could tell the salt was still there, sliding around in the hole reserved for breathing. It made the entire recovery inhalation process more difficult.  
“Hey, guys! I think I found Mister Spender!”

They turned at the sound of Isaac’s voice, alarmed by the suddenness of it. He was running toward them and- laughing? That was odd.

“Have a nice trip to the golden throne I take it?”

“Max.”

“No, seriously what happened?”

Isaac grinned, a twinkle of mischief in his eyes. “Oh, I think you’re going to get a real kick outta this.”

 

“Oh my god.” Isabel covered her mouth with both of her hands and glanced away, shoulders shaking violently. “How did he even end up here?”  
“Don’t ask questions nobody has the answer to, Max.” Isaac rested his elbow on Max’s shoulder and leaned on him, the corner of his mouth twitching- a sign he was trying just as hard as Isabel not to laugh.  
Spender sat over a dunk tank filled with water, a large circle next to his head with large painted letters that read ‘HIT ME’. Women, children, and men of all ages took their turns tossing rubber balls at the circle as a carny sat beside the dunk tank snickering.  
“I don’t even know why I’m surprised.” Cindy mumbled.

Ed nudged Isabel and whispered some kind of joke in her ear. It took her a moment to register what he’d said, but when the wheels finished turning Isabel broke out laughing. Cindy glanced over her shoulder at them and her wide grin faltered and fell to a small smile. “Hey Eddy, do you want to toss a ball?”

Ed turned around, eyes wide in realization that yes he could indeed dunk his teacher in a pit of water and that was something he would very much like to do. He nodded enthusiastically and ran up the stairs that lead to the line. Cindy made a move to follow, only to feel someone grab her arm. She yelped and jumped, but relaxed when it was only Isabel. “Oh my goodness! You startled me!”

“You wanna toss a few at Mister Spender, too?”

Cindy’s eyebrows creased, but she smiled and nodded with a very small word of validation. Isabel was dragging her up the stairs the first syllable she’d uttered, leaving Max and Isaac at the bottom to stay and watch. Isaac felt Max’s eyes on him and frowned at the expression he saw on his friend’s face.

“What?”

“You really don’t wanna throw a ball at Spender?”

“Why would I?”

“I don’t know- years of secrets and emotional neglect?”

Isaac sighed, but thought about it, eyes scanning the form of their helpless teacher who sat with his arms crossed and vehement grimace on his face. Maybe he should?

“Nah…”

“Why not? You might not get this opportunity again.” Max snickered and gestured to the pit.

“If Ed doesn’t knock him down, Isabel will. Then it won’t be half as fun seeing him get soaked.” Max couldn’t really argue with that reasoning, so he looked to Ed. The boy was maniacally smiling to himself, wringing his hands as he waited his turn to toss a rubber ball. “Besides, I haven’t gotten to see a lot of you without the group lately. Kinda wanna hang out with my best friend alone, ya know?”

Max felt his face warm up, but he hid it in a sarcastic comment and some complaint about the weather, to which Isaac slapped his arm.

“Never mind. I want nothing to do with you.”

“Aww, Isaac come back!”

 

Ed was focused. His eyes had already met Spender’s and the teacher was sweating through his tank top.

That was just what Ed wanted.

“Yes, be terrified for I am your worst nightmare today, dear teacher!” Isabel patted Ed gently on the back and sighed. Cindy laughed- nervously- and took a rubber ball after Isabel. Isabel tossed her ball first, pulling her arm back and throwing it forward with as much strength as she could muster. Spender screeched and covered his head. It’d been a good call, considering she made a hole in the sign next to his head- even though she’d missed the target.

Cindy went up next, tossing the ball back and forth in her hands as she decided just how to throw it. She could throw it the same way Isabel did, but she feared her accuracy was just as bad if not worse and she’d miss the target by a yard. She thought about doing an underthrow, but there was no way that would hit the target from their distance. Cindy hummed and tilted her head from side-to-side. “Need help?”

She felt her heart jump in her chest at not just Ed’s voice, but the proximity. He took her hands gently and positioned her so that she was in a perfect throwing stance. One hand held hers and the other laid at her forearm. He was warm- just like she remembered him being. “You’ve gotta be careful about your stance ‘cause you’ll end up missing big time, like Izzy.”

“Hey!”

“Keep your eyes on the target and your hand steady, and you should be good to throw the ball! This is why you should come train at the dojo. It’d really help your spectral shots, ya know!”

Cindy gulped and hoped to all hope he didn’t feel her tensing.

“Ed just let her toss the ball already! You’re giving Mister Spender a heart-attack!”

It was true. Spender sat with her legs at his chest, frozen in fear, watching his students with demeaned eyes. “Look at him! He’s begging for mercy!”

Ed snickered in Cindy’s ear and pulled away. “Take the shot!”

With a yelp Cindy shut her eyes and threw the ball.

It missed.

It missed and hit the carny.

 

After five minutes of Cindy apologizing profusely to the nice man with twenty-million piercings in places she didn’t think piercings could go, she found her way back to Ed and Isabel with her metaphorical tail between her legs. “Sorry, guys.”  
“Don’t be!” Isabel laughed and slapped her shoulder. “Ed’s still got a shot! If we didn’t make it, he will for sure!”

Spender wasn’t so worried anymore. In fact, he was looking very confident in himself. If Isabel couldn’t hit, then Ed certainly couldn’t!

But he did.

With a swing of his arm and a keen sight, the blonde spectral threw the ball, using as much balance between strength and accuracy as he could muster.

Ed hit the target and the teacher went sinking down into the deepest pits of the tank.

The crowd started cheering in a wave of applause and flying fruits and vegetables.

Cindy’s eyes searched for Ed’s, but when she found them his own were on Isabel. He picked his friend up and swung her around, much to Isabel’s surprise. There was a screech and “Ed, stop it we’re gonna fall over the railing”, but there was laughter. Cindy’s hands twitched at her sides in search of something- a hand. Ed’s hand- the hand she wasn’t allowed to hold anymore.

Maybe if she’d never brought him home…

Well then what would have happened? They would have found out later and the severing of their relationship would have hurt so much more. Cindy still wondered if that would have been worth it, though. If she just had a little more time to hug him and walk home with him and sing horrible duets with him, she almost felt like she could have stayed his other half.

Isabel squeaked just as Ed lifted her feet off the ground and threw her over his shoulder for the sake of twisting around in fast circles.

Cindy sighed, shook her head, smiled, and tossed a rubber ball at Ed’s face.


	3. Masterpiece

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Ed and Isabel remain best friends, and yet Ed feels like something is wrong. They’re setting off fireworks for the Fourth of July, and usually Isabel would love the display of colors and sounds as much as he does, but she’s sitting on the ground looking angry. Her eyes are on the sky, but she’s looking way past the explosions."

The first time he sees her that way is when they are standing under the street lamp.

It’s been a long night with a long dinner and it followed a long week he doesn’t really want to remember. He’s just found out his girlfriend (the one he was sure he was head-over-heels in love with) was his cousin. Then he found out that she doesn’t care and that she still wants to be his. It was awkward and sad and overall uncomfortable and horrible- telling her he was not interested, because up until that point he’d been so invested in her. He’d planned on spending every moment he could with Cindy, and to see her face when he didn’t kiss her cheek as he left and when he didn’t hold her hand, it was hard and it hurt. It hurt a lot.

That’s why he’s shocked when he looks up at Isabel and she looks like that.

Her hair is a mess in that bun she refuses to let down and her jacket falls loosely at her shoulders. The tears in her eyes are so rare and she’s letting him see them just once- it somehow makes her even… what is the word?  
She was a painting. She was more than anything he could ever draw. She was a sculpture he’d never quite be able to capture. Isabel was a stroke of genius and for the first time he just wants to hold her. He’d felt it while Velda pulled on her soul- watching Isabel fight for her life, even though she was unconscious and had no idea what was happening. He’d felt it when he’d caught her eyes as she sat at the bottom of Cindy’s stairs, watching him with a sorry look when she had nothing to apologize for. He’d felt it when she stood there alone in the middle of their front yard after the Ghost Train, holding her arm and staring at the ground hard like she was lost in thoughts he could never touch. She probably was.  
It is a feeling to reach out and grab her and keep her safe and just make sure she knows she is- she is…

He kisses her that night for the first time. Ed feels something in him so warm he can hardly contain himself (from doing what, he doesn’t know). When they pull away, he fights to keep from looking at her and saying “Izzy, I don’t know what I was thinking”.  
Seriously, where had he been that entire week?

 

The second time he sees her that way, they’re in eighth grade and he’s bent over struggling to breathe and she’s covered in sweat and grime and they’ve got ectoplasm all over their clothes. Some part of him is focused on not passing out, but another part of him is worried about Isabel.

They’ve just taken down some sort of spirit in a trench coat with some spooky limbs from lots of different animals underneath. It’s after school and the gym is empty and Max and Isaac are on the other side of the building, busy tackling some business revolving around the groundhog spirit from a year ago. Ed’s trying so hard to see straight, but he’s all over the place and his lungs burn and that is probably the last thing he needs to worry about. He probably started falling or something, because Isabel’s hands are the only thing keeping him standing up straight, pressed sternly against his shoulders. He hardly hears her voice, but he can make out her laugh.

She says “Ed, take it easier next time” and “It really knocked the air outta you, huh?”

When Ed finally catches his breathe, he loses it again.

Her hair is loose and her eyes are wide in amusement with her pink lips (that he remembers the touch of like he remembers the feel of his tool) parted to breathe in as much as she can. Her hands that were stern before feel so enrapturing, and suddenly he’s staring at that art gallery portrait all over again. Isabel tilts her head just-so-slightly and asks “Ed, are you okay?”

All he can do is nod slowly while his brain tries to get up to speed with what he is feeling and thinking. They said “that was weird” and “let’s not do that again” but he is starting to question why it was “weird’ back then.

Isabel seems happy with his answer, so she just slings his arm over her shoulders and hoists him out of the gym.

 

The third time, they are freshman and it’s Homecoming. No dates for any of them (even though he catches Max staring at Isaac every now and then. He teases the batter covertly, making kissy faces while Max shuffles agitatedly and rolls his eyes. Isaac is oblivious). There is no Isabel walking down the stairs and taking their breaths away, but Isabel on the dancefloor is something else entirely. She can’t dance for the life of her, but she is Isabel and she doesn’t care and neither does he because he’s standing right next to her busting out all of his weird(er) moves.

Well, maybe he cares more than he thought he did because, as wacky and weird as her movements are (hands and arms jerking in places at the wrong beats), he is entranced by her and has to apologize to strangers several times for hitting them in the face on accident. Ed wishes he had a camera. She could have been a home-movie, one that they watched just to laugh at for years to come, plunging into nostalgia on a random night just because they can. It’d be a decade later and he’d sit his kids down on the couch and say “Watch! Watch! Watch! Look, there’s-!” There’s who? Auntie Isabel doesn’t seem right. Miss Isabel has an even worse ring to it. Misses? Misses who? That ‘M’ is right, but every word he matches is wrong.

She finds his eyes while she hops up and down between Isaac and Max (who are happy to dance with her as they avoid too much eye-contact with each-other) and the look in them changes. Ed sees that mischief fade to something soft and beckoning.  
She grabs his hands, sets them at her waist, and wraps her arms around his neck. His heart is jumping in his chest by then, hands twitching where they lay on her. It isn’t like this is the first time they’d danced together. This is a penny in the millions of times she’d had her arms around his neck or he’d held her, so why do his hands start sweating like they are? Isabel doesn’t seem to notice how lost in- whatever he is lost in- he is, so she continues smiling, her usual huge grin that belongs only to the big screen production that is her.

Then she sets her head on his shoulder and everything feels right. She’s close and she’s right there. She’s in his arms and she’s happy. The girl who’s usually so pent-up and violent and sharp- she’s calm and she’s enjoying herself. His hands come up from her waist to wrap around her in a hug and they continue swaying back and forth. Ed shuts his eyes and buries his head in her hair with a large dorky smile.

 

The fourth time, Ed is jealous. It’s sophomore year. He’s known Isaac for all of five years and yet- what the hell are they doing so close to each-other? Why is Isaac at their house all the time? Ed is totally cool with them hanging out together- just why so much? Why so often? What are they doing when he’s not around?

Homework? Video games? Movies?! Kissing?! MAKING OUT?!

He sits in their old middle school clubroom with Isaac, painting things at random and letting it splatter to the floor when he gets bored of it- which isn’t difficult because one thing is on his mind and nothing else holds his attention. Isaac sits on the other side of the couch and makes tiny clouds with his fingers, manipulating small rainbows and sparks and flashes of lightning. It is silent and nobody else is there yet. Max has to lock up the corner store (his dad is out of town and Zoe is spending the night a friend's house) and Isabel has to stay after for volleyball practice (she’d joined the team because the coach begged and pleaded and eventually Isabel figured “Why the hell not?”). Spender has to talk to a few teachers about a few teacher things- nothing Ed nor Isaac care about.

Ed brings it up nonchalantly. “So, what’s the deal with you and Isabel?” Well, he tries at least. There has to be credit there. Isaac looks at him with a cocked eyebrow and a twitching eye, already not appreciating where the conversation is going. “I’m sorry?”  
Ed realizes he has to be a little more forward, “I’m just curious about what’s been going on with you and her. You two tossing the dice or something?” so he is.

Isaac waves his cloud away, expression tightening into what seems like curiosity and mild disgust. “I don’t get what you’re saying?”

Ed shrugs and refuses to meet his eyes, instead focusing them on the ground. It isn’t like Isaac can really read his eyes through his glasses. Isabel is the only one who can do that. “Look, I just wanna know if you’re doing stuff with Isabel, because she’s like a sister to me. I just wanna know if there’s a chance you two are… doing things like dates and kissing and stuff like that. No big deal.” He hears Isaac move awkwardly besides him, and some part of Ed revels in that fact. Yes, he can squirm. He is touching Izzy, he can squirm all day! He knows Isaac is still his friend- but he wasn’t about to tolerate them keeping a relationship secret from him! He would have asked Isabel, but Ed knows there’s no way she would be upfront about a secret. Then Isaac sets his hands on either of Ed’s shoulders and pulls him so that they are eye-to-eye. “I’m shocked I need to say this, but since you obviously need to hear it…” Ed’s eyebrows furrow, ready to hear the worst. Isaac doesn’t seem nearly as anxious, face so neutral he almost mistakes it for Isaac’s ‘Max’ impression.

“Ed,” Isaac says “I’m not dating your girlfriend.”

 

The next time is during the following year, when Ed is well aware that Isabel isn’t seeing anybody and Isaac was only her lab partner last year. The four of them are stronger than ever, but somehow Ed isn’t satisfied. Max has gotten over being awkward around Isaac (took him long enough) and is pretty much attached to the medium’s hip. It’s mutual. Isaac always seems to retreat into himself when Max isn’t around- like he doesn’t know he belongs. Ed and Isabel remain best friends, and yet Ed feels like something is wrong. They’re setting off fireworks for the Fourth of July, and usually Isabel would love the display of colors and sounds as much as he does, but she’s sitting on the ground looking angry. Her eyes are on the sky, but she’s looking way past the explosions.  
He sits down, offers her a cola, and he doesn’t even have to say anything.

“I never mentioned him” Isabel says with a hint of guilt in her voice “but I liked him a lot.”

She’s apologizing for not telling him. She promised she would tell him back when they went through his relationship (he cringed thinking about it) with Cindy. She’s still talking, so he pays attention and pushes away the sting in his chest. He understands it, but it still hurts. There’s another feeling there, too. It doesn’t sting, as it’s more of a dropping feeling. Ed almost feels disheartened. He ignores it. “Naturally, he has a girlfriend I didn’t know about” he can tell she’s bitter about it- there’s sarcasm dripping from her voice “because nothing can ever be simple with us. Nothing can ever happen and not be complicated, right, because we’re the Activity Club? Everything has to be screwed and there can’t be just one answer and there definitely can’t just be one question.” Isabel pulls her legs up and wraps her arms around them, acting like she’s cold but he knows she’s not. She’s red-hot with passion. She’s angry. She’s hurt. She’s a lot of things. She’s burning.

Ed shakes his head and actually takes his eyes off of her to look at the fireworks. He’s not shocked to find they’re less of a sight. He seldom finds anything that could match. Match what? Out of the corner of his eye, he sees her looking up from her lap to the exploding rockets, too. 

“Well where’s the fun in that?” He says it with a smile- one he didn’t know he had. It isn’t toothy and it’s not cocky. His grin is genuine. He cares.

Ed doesn’t see her face from where he’s sitting, but he’s assuming she looks disbelieving. “Don’t get philosophical on me, Ed.”

He looks at her, jaw dropping exaggeratedly to emphasize just how insulted he is. “I’m not Mister Spender.” Isabel giggles and his hurt pride slips away. He loves that sound.

Max is standing next to Isaac and Spender is lighting another firework. 

“You sure about that?”

Ed snorts and shrugs. “I’m just tryin’ to say that maybe it’s for the better? If we constantly knew what questions to ask and where to look to find the answers, what would we have to live for?” Ed pauses and waits for Isabel to respond. She doesn’t. He waits a little while longer until eventually realizing she doesn’t plan on saying anything at all. He takes it upon himself to fill the silence for her. “All masterpieces need a little thought, you know?”

She’s looking at him now- really looking at him, and he’s used to the breath he loses when he looks back. Color from the fireworks and the moon and the fire from the lighters used to set flames on the fuses- they all mesh together to paint her face like a kaleidoscope. She’s looking at him curiously and he needs to remind himself that she’s going to say something. He has to pay attention.

“Saying ‘all lives are masterpieces’ is a little philosophical, Ed. Admit it.”

“I wasn’t talking about all lives” he grins “I was talking about yours.”

She’s blushing and grabbing his arm to twist it and hurt him, but she’s not really trying and in reality she’s just pulling him closer. Ed doesn’t try to fight it- he never does. He follows her grip and finds her burying her head into his chest. For a few seconds he’s worried that she’s crying, but her shoulders are perfectly still and her hands are clenching and unclenching at his back. He wraps his arms around her, for what must be the millionth time in their lives, and rests his chin on her head. One hand runs through her hair.

By the time Spender’s telling them they need to pack it up and go home and Max is chasing Isaac around with a sparkler and Isaac’s laughing with a cloud in his hand (filled with rain that will unpleasantly surprise Max, Ed assumes), they’re so at peace.  
Ed is laying back against the grass and Isabel’s head is on his chest and they’re stargazing together. Her hand is beside her head and she’s curling into him because he’s warm and she’d been shivering earlier. Both of his arms are behind his head, but he knows they want to be around her. He’s used to this feeling by now- though Ed does acknowledge, for the first time, that he wants to call the masterpiece his own.


	4. Is That Lipstick or Blood on the Mirror? Oh Good It's Lipstick That Could Have Been Really Creepy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ed did not deserve this. He did not deserve ANY of this.

The morning had started out the way one would expect a morning to start after a very long night with the activity club. He’d woken to a piece of pizza in his hand and a spilled soda in the other. His glasses were crooked on his face, and for a moment he’d worried he’d broken them in his sleep. The lights were out and his curtains were shut. The only sound came from his game station, which was on and had probably been on all night. He’d groaned and sat up, placing his feet tentatively on the carpet. There might have been a body at the edge of his bed, fast asleep. He wasn’t particularly sure where Max and Isaac had fallen asleep (apparently he was the wuss that knocked out first) and he sure as hell didn’t want to wake them up by kicking them in the stomachs or stomping their faces in. Isabel was more than likely passed out on the couch or in her room. If she had fallen asleep in his room things might have been… odd. Cautiously, he’d padded across his room with blurry vision his hands just couldn’t seem to clear.

He hadn’t awoken on his own, no. He still wanted to be fast asleep in bed because, while he was definitely the first asleep, he bet it’d been something like three AM when the night took him to rest. His alarm hadn’t gone off. In fact, he thought he’d seen it smashed at the foot of his nightstand. Actually, what had woken him up was a persistent knocking at his bedroom door, loud and obnoxious and everything a guy who’s half-asleep would hate. He’d endured it for what felt like hours, but it hadn’t stopped, which meant answering its call was the only choice to be made. He nearly stepped on one of his controllers, but stumbled blindly passed it- right into his door. Readjusting his glasses so that he looked at least somewhat conscious, he opened the door.

Perhaps that had been his first mistake.

He hadn’t expected to see Cindy there, first of all. She must have returned early from her cooking classes in downtown Mayview, because that'd been her reason for not showing up to their get-together last night. (“Oh, Eddy, I’m sorry! I have to get to bed early. I’ve got a grueling cooking class tomorrow and I just can’t fall asleep again. Love you guys!”). She must have decided to make breakfast for them because she had plastic bags filled with batter and the like in his shaking fist. That was nice, but he’d have to stop her. She wasn’t far enough along in her cooking classes to not burn down the dojo’s kitchen. Second of all, he certainly wasn’t expecting her to be mad. She had one had at her hip, blonde bun bouncing every time she impatiently tapped her foot. The plastic bag swayed noticeably, and that’s when he realized her fist was actually shaking and fists do that when people are angry. Third of all, he wasn’t expecting her to slap him across the face. “Would you like to explain what happened in your bathroom last night, Edward?”  
“No, but I would like somebody else to explain what happened.” He rubbed his cheek, cocking an eyebrow as his lips thinned. He was trying not to be obvious about whatever irritation he was feeling about being palmed in the face for mysterious reasons, but it showed. “‘Cause, you know, what happened?” Cindy pursed her lips at him, stomped her foot, and twisted on her heel with his wrist in her hand.

The closer they got the bathroom, the more anxious he got. Isaac and Max were standing outside of the door, seemingly wide-awake but dreading it. Max leaned against the wall with his arms in the pockets of his jeans that he’d never changed out of, banging the back of his head against the wall in a steady calming rhythm. Isaac was beside him, toying with his phone and pressing a sequence of numbers Ed was desperately hoping wasn’t 911. The thing that bothered him the most, though, was Isabel. The ponytail she’d begun tying into her hair every night was as messy as the rest of her was. A strap of her tank top fell off her shoulder while the other wasn’t far behind. Her pajama pants sagged at her feet, oversized because they were actually Ed’s and she’d stolen them. Her arms were crossed, too, but not in the nonchalant way that Max’s were. No, they were tight at her chest and her body was swaying back and forth impatiently and her eyes were fiery. Her aura wasn’t large, but it was eroding off of her in waves- enough for him to notice.

When Isabel finally locked eyes on him, he gave her his best smile- an awkward smile considering he was being tugged along the hallway by a woman five inches shorter than he was. The sentiment was not met with kindness or relief. Instead, Isabel glared at him, slammed the door of the bathroom open, and pointed sharply at the inside. Ed spared a glance at Max and Isaac, who gave him equally clueless shrugs and nods of empathy.  
When he walked through the door, he realized he desperately needed that empathy.

On the mirror in bright red lipstick was a large heart, in which laid the words: “I had a great time, Ed. Call me again.”

His stomach just about dropped a mile. There was nothing he could do or say. Well, there was a lot he could say. Who was this mystery woman, because he’d never called anyone over, and if he did what the hell did he do last night? He didn’t drink or do copious amounts of drugs, so it sure wasn’t like he’d called some random chick on his phone. While he still wasn’t awake enough to quite remember when he went to bed and why, he was awake enough to know he had never kissed any girls but the ones steaming behind him (why were they steaming?). He was just as confused as he was moments ago when he’d gotten slapped across the face- which, he might add, Cindy really didn’t have a right to do (CONSIDERING THEY BROKE UP IN, LIKE, SEVENTH GRADE AND WERE COUSINS).

“Ed, who wrote that and why did she have a great time last night?”

There was Isabel’s calm, heated voice. He saw her in the mirror, where she stood at the door with her fingers tapping along her arms. Cindy was peeking her head through the door, but otherwise kept her distance. Ed swallowed heavily and turned around, prepared to give Isabel an essay on why he was innocent and how he really had no clue what was going on.

“Bu- uh duh- uh, huh?”

What came out was slightly less impactful jabber that wasn’t helpful in any way at all. In fact, Cindy’s breathy exhale sounded similar to that of a pterodactyl’s screech. She threw her arms in the air and all but rammed her way passed Max and Isaac out of the bathroom. She muttered a range of curse words in different tongues she wasn’t necessarily fluent in under her breath, enough to make a sailor blush on their worst day. If he knew Cindy, which he did, she would need to calm down for a few hours (or days) before she was ready to hear a logical explanation without mocking every word he said with a very unsettling Miss Piggy impression. Well, at least he wouldn’t need to convince her not to make pancakes. He was sure that was pretty much off the table- no pun intended.

He glanced to Isabel, whose lips were in a thin line. Her nails scratched at her arms, not enough to leave blood, but certainly enough to vent whatever she might have been feeling. Her nostrils flared, but that was hardly noticeable next to the death in her eyes. His death. The death he was still so unsure he deserved. If he knew Isabel, which he did, he could expect a premature apocalypse with the chance of another ice age. “Um, so…” Ed pulled at the sleeve of his pajama shirt, twirling his fingers in the smooth polyester. What came out of his mouth next had to be smart- smart enough to lay this ‘mystery woman’ business to bed and funny enough to diffuse the fury he could see building in her shoulders. Isaac and Max looked on with wonder and apprehension, and Ed envied their positions as members of the audience.

Isaac stood behind Max, tugging at the back of Max’s shirt with one hand while the other rested comfortably on Max’s shoulder. He bore a look similar to that of a frightened dog. His eyes said “I am interested in this conversation” and his body said “wow I am asking for death’s sweet embrace”. Max was placing his weight in his heels in case he had to make a quick getaway, which was a very viable scenario that Ed was impressed he knew to prepare for. After all, he’d only seen Isabel rage once or twice and he’d never gotten the brunt of it. He learned from the mistakes of others- smart guy. Of course, part of that was probably because he could feel Isaac’s chest at his back, which was less impressive and more amusing than anything. Max set a hand on Isaac’s elbow, a signal that let Isaac know to be ready. Ready for you to be impaled on Isabel’s umbrella of doom- say something, moron!

Ed’s eyes trailed across the tile floor to Isabel’s feet, too confused and nervous to do much of anything else. “So, last night…” Isabel exhaled, and he sensed that maybe, just maybe, she was going to listen with an open mind. “Last night must have been wild, amiright?”  
And then, as only Ed was capable of, he screwed it up royally.

Isabel found his nonchalant shrug amusing. She found it so amusing, in fact, that she went to go train and get some fresh air after saying in the sweetest way possible that he’d better not follow her because she would use him as a very serious ‘sparing’ partner. That went well, all things considering.  
Ed watched the bathroom door silently as Isaac and Max piled in to desperately avoid colliding with Isabel as she left. He sat there staring for a while, letting his mind wander around the realm of possibilities. A great many things crossed his mind; perhaps it was a vengeful poltergeist? He thought not. Had he done it himself in his sleep? While he indeed had a history of sleepwalking (actually there was a really funny story involving him sleepwalking, some bologna and a rabid squirrel), that didn’t seem like his sleepwalking style. All stayed still in the bathroom, not a sound but the chirping of innocent birds Ed was deeply considering hurting. Then, finally, he said:

“You guys are jerks, you know that?”

Max and Isaac broke out into gut-busting fits of laughter, and that is the story of why, a few weeks later, Isaac and Max woke up one morning with a beard and monocle on their faces and their ankles tied together in a thick line of ink.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day!


	5. I've Read a Story Like This Somewhere and it Doesn't End Well

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Isaac and Cindy force the rest of the club to get their fortunes read in a creepy old tent. They proceed to try to enjoy the rest of the festival- try.

Freshman Year

“Please stop groaning. It’s just one fortune!”

Isabel took Cindy’s begging as an invitation to groan even louder, throwing her head back as they grew closer to the ominous tent. Mayview had a thing for going all-out for every festival ever. Growing up, Isabel recalled seeing fire dancers. It was something that stuck with her for years. She couldn’t have been any older than five, watching women and men alike leap through circles of fire. Tiny Isabel had locked eyes with one of the performers, a tall woman with raven hair as long as Isabel was tall. Her eyes were painted black with thick eyeliner that reminded Isabel of a tiger. The woman smiled at her and proceeded to swallow a stick of fire right before her eyes. That was the kind of thing Isabel found excitement in at the Tree Festival (Mayview’s main export ironically being wood somehow, the most boring of all exporting goods). Walking into a creepy tent with some even creepier witch-looking eyesore of a person was not her idea of fun.

“Cindy, keep in mind that you are my friend and I am only saying this because I care about you,” Max put his palm together and brought them under his chin. He inhaled heavily, preparing for a number of reactions and backlashes he would get from any of his friends “you literally fight spirits as a hobby. Paying a woman to blow baby powder in your face shouldn’t be interesting to you.”

“Oh, Max!” Cindy raised a hand and smacked him on the back, hard enough that he coughed and did his best to rub at the bones he was sure she’d knocked out of place. “It’s silly entertainment! I know none of it is real, but isn’t it fun to pretend it is?”

“Nah” Ed’s response was immediate. He walked beside Isaac with one hand in his pocket and the other twirling his tool around. He was slouching and pouting like the man-child that he was, having been out-numbered on their next activity. He wanted to go take a helicopter ride, since there was a professional pilot in town offering cheap joy rides. Isabel and Max were interested, but were way more excited about the daredevil show that was scheduled to start in forty minutes. Unfortunately, each helicopter ride took about an hour since they went all around Mayview, and Ed was just as interested in seeing a man leap over a shark tank with his motorcycle. That left them forty minutes to wander around blindly- and they had, until Cindy spotted the large obnoxious multi-colored blinking sign that read “FORTUNE TELLER”. Isaac had all but leaped onto the giddiness-train and pushed Max and Isabel in the direction of the tent. Cindy had taken that as a positive reaction, and thus was Ed’s situation.

“Oh, come on guys.” Isaac wrapped his arms around Ed’s and Max’s shoulders and pulled them close, a wide dorky smile on his face. Isabel wasn’t surprised he’d bought into the whole ‘fortune teller’ thing. He was, after all, Isaac. He believed in aliens and wishes on shooting stars and a number of other things the club could mock him for. Had Cindy not been with them, maybe they would have gotten away with no going to see the fortune teller. Because Isaac had somebody to back him up, however, it was much harder to avoid fifteen minutes of hocus pocus hoopla. “We’ve got time to kill. Why not just go with it?”

“The last time I just ‘went with it’, Isaac” Max’s air quotes knocked Isaac’s hand off of his shoulder, not that either of them noticed “you ended up in the E.R!”

“Okay, that was your fault, though.”

“Noisy brats! Noisy, noisy. All of you shut up.”

Isabel jumped, eyes wide and fearful as they found a strange elderly woman. She looked like one would assume a fortune teller in a horror story would, white hair that was greasy and looked as though it hadn’t been brushed in years. Her nose took up half her face and was pink from all of the warts that covered her skin. Her eyes were a beautiful green, but not beautiful enough to soften her face. Isabel could almost see the blue eyeshadow on her eyelids under all of the mascara and thick, raccoon-like eyeliner. Her robes were a ‘creative’ mixture of light blues, oranges, and browns. Rings of all metals and different gems lined her fingers, tied together by the many necklaces she wore.

Isaac jumped and tugged frantically on Ed’s shoulders and Max’s sleeve. Lightning crackled at his fingers- that was probably why he was hiding his hands. Ed dropped his tool while the other hand bunched up the fabric of his pocket and pulled it inside-out. Somewhere, internally, he might have realized that dropping his paintbrush was the literal last thing he should have done, but in all of the other panicked thoughts that crossed his face it was hard to tell. Max threw an arm out in front of Isaac and gripped Ed’s sleeve, his dark aura seeping through the air like a snake lifting its head. It was a warning he probably forgot the old woman couldn’t see. Cindy, while startled by the unconventional greeting, plastered the best fake smile on her face that she could and spoke first. Isabel could see her body trembling, but she guessed she wasn’t one to judge. “Hi! We’re here to get our fortunes read?”

The elderly woman didn’t answer at first, eyes in a daze as she watched the manly trio desperately clinging to each-other and themselves. It was as though something about them caught her interest, like she was doing some pre-fortune people reading. Either way, it was creepy and it had to stop. “Um, hello?” Isabel jumped around and waved her hands about, trying to catch the woman’s attention. The fortune teller cast her harsh eyes upon Isabel and grimaced. “Yeah, we’re here so you can read our fortunes? You know,” Isabel rubbed her fingers together “give you mon~ney?”

“I know what you brats are here for. I’m a psychic you impatient little-”

“If we could keep this PG-13, that’d be great.” Max had seemed to recover from his initial defensive mode, because he crossed the way, leaped over one of the chairs and took the seat, throwing his feet up on the table. Isabel heard Isaac’s muffled nagging about manners somewhere behind her, but she shook it off and took her own seat beside Max. 

“So, are you gonna read our futures or what?”

Ed followed behind, Cindy close after. Isaac exhaled heavily when he took his seat next to Max, who gave his friend a shit-eating grin. Isabel was just pleased Cindy had promised to pay for their readings.

*********

“Isaac O’Connor, that is your name, yes?”

Isaac nodded as he offered the old woman his palm. She glanced down at it and took his wrist in her vice-like grip, her long fingernails pinching his skin. The medium shifted in his seat, uncomfortable, but otherwise didn’t say a word. “Yes, yes it is.” (“It’s not like she asked us to repeat our names a thousand times” Max muttered to himself, only to have Cindy reach over and knock his cap off of his head). “What do you see?”

She hummed and licked her lips, trailing her thumb’s nail along his veins. Isabel felt shivers run down her spine just watching it. She couldn’t imagine how Isaac must have felt. He was shifting from side-to-side in his seat, looking like he desperately wanted to pull away. The elderly woman reached into a pouch at her hip and blew mystery dust in Isaac’s face (dust that smelled suspiciously like ginger). He coughed and spluttered but straightened up enough to hear what the fortune teller had to say. “I see great pain in your future.”

Isaac visibly gulped. “Great pain?”

“Yes, brought to you as the consequence of someone else’s agony.”

Isaac audibly gasped like a scorned woman in a drama. Isabel snorted. It was a little too easy to imagine Isaac in a pink dress tossing an even pinker floral hat and glove at his enemies. It was even easier to imagine him whipping out a pink handkerchief with his initials sewn into it and dabbing his eyes. She snorted again to hide the belly laugh she felt coming on. Isaac was less amused, leaning forward into the table. “Did I cause this person pain and I’m getting it in return?”

The old woman winced and shifted her head to and fro. “Eh, not really. Inadvertently, I guess.”

*********

“Cindy Balton, yes?”

“Yes, yes, yes!” She was moving in her seat, up and down, back and forth, and wouldn’t stop no matter how stern Isabel’s hand on her shoulder was. Eventually Isabel gave up altogether, deciding instead to watch her friend grind the chair’s legs into the floor. The old woman reached out to grab Cindy’s wrist and the girl all but punched the woman in the face with her enthusiasm. “Tell me about my love life!” Her face turned red as she glanced away, one hand covering her eyes. Her smile was wide and bright, brighter than it should have been for ‘not actually believing any of that stuff was real’. “Oh, I’m so embarrassed.”

The fortune teller blew the fake psychic smoke in her face, and sniffled to hide a laugh. “You should be. You’ve got none.”

All traces of Cindy’s good mood seeped out of her at once. Ed and Max looked at each-other and shrugged. Isabel didn’t even bother to look Isaac’s way. The medium had his head in his arms on the table, anxiety and shame in the air he breathed out. His fingers twitched every now and then, but that was the only movement she could see. “I’m sorry?”  
“You’ve got no love life, toots. Your cupid has left” the elderly woman pointed in the air “and I don’t see any future where it comes back.”

*********

Ed patted Cindy on the back as she weeped into his jacket, shooting the roof of the tent looks of loathing and disdain. He was always the one to deal with her on the rare occasions that she was crying real tears. Crocodile tears were quite common with her, and in those cases it was usually Isaac who played along and overreacted for the purpose of getting them in or out of certain situations, like tricking a teacher into letting them use the restroom so they could go on spectral business. Isabel had a good memory or two of Isaac holding an obnoxiously loud, weeping Cindy in his arms and calling the adult of the week that was in their way “a monster, a fiend, a wicked no-good person”. When Cindy was actually crying, though, Ed was always the first person she latched to.

“Give me your wrist, child.”

“Nah, ya see, I think I’m good-!”

Max yanked on his wrist where the fortune teller was holding him still. His heels dug into the carpet enough that it bunched up under his chair, which was standing only on its hind legs while he struggled to get away. He’d taken to standing when the fortune teller dug her nails into his skin, but soon seemed to realize his height wasn’t aiding his efforts. The woman pulled him closer, only to have him pull back. The two shifted back and forth across the table like a human Ping-Pong battle. Isabel watched with growing amusement. As avidly as Max was speaking about the non-legitimacy of fortune tellers earlier, the speed and urgency with which he was trying to escape made it look like he believed in whatever he’d hear just a little…

Eventually the fortune teller jerked Max to being bent over the table, pinning his wrist to the tablecloth with the length of her nails. Max thrashed about for a few seconds before his butt fell from the air and he willingly laid his wrist against the table. Instead of blowing the powder into his face, she took a handful of it and dumped it on his head. The old woman hummed and ran one of her claws along the lines of his palm, eyebrows furrowing in concentration.

“I see a very rainy day in your future, the kind where thunder echoes in your ear.” (“OH COME ON!” came Isaac’s muffled scream from where he sat with his head in his arms).

“Great.” Max mumbled, slowly sliding away from the fortune teller. He slithered to the floor, where he continued to mutter about how ridiculous psychics were and how stupid everything was.

*********

Isabel grudgingly took the weeping Cindy out of Ed’s arms. It was a slow process, as Ed couldn’t decide which situation he’d rather get out of, but he quickly shuffled Cindy into Isabel’s care and offered the fortune teller his hand. With a cautious glance at Max, who was sitting back in his chair, pouting at his phone (probably not actually doing anything but scrolling through his apps), Ed swallowed whatever nervousness he was feeling and faced the fortune teller like a man.

That meant he squirmed in his seat like a kid that needed to use the restroom.

He coughed as he swallowed some of the powder she blew in his face. “Hush!” She smacked him on the nose and he jerked up in his seat, shoulders back. Isabel patted Cindy’s shoulder, somehow even less empathetically than Ed had been, watching the elderly woman read Ed’s palm with great concentratio- “You’re going to pick a fight with the wrong man.”

*********

With only Isabel left, who was distracted from the reading because she was too busy watching all of her friends sulk, the fortune teller worked more confidently than she had before. Isaac’s mourning had grown into something even more pathetic. He laid back in his chair with his arms hanging loosely at his sides, his face devoid of expression as he stared solemnly up at the ceiling of the tent. Cindy resigned to crying into one of her forearms, as Ed was busy cradling his head in his hands and questioning his choices. Max had pulled his hoodie over his head and tapped voluminously on his phone, probably more to distract himself than anything else. The fortune teller hummed something like “Staying Alive” except slower and creepier. Of course, that still wasn’t what Isabel was paying attention to. She would have been lying if she said she wasn’t uneasy. So far all of her friends had received horrible fortunes, and she doubted she was going to be any different. She’d hardly noticed when the psychic had blown powder in her face.

“You,” Isabel jumped and looked to the elderly woman, who was watching her with her overly done green eyes “you will find yourself unwillingly involved with the wrong boy.” Her heart sank, and she wasn’t sure if it was because she had hope that she would hear a different fortune, or something else she wasn’t entirely ready to face yet. There were lots of different scenarios that were coming to mind, and she didn’t like any of them. In fact, all of them terrified or annoyed her, and she wasn’t sure which was worse. Either way, she was shaking and she couldn’t stand another second under the tent with the crazy old bat. All of her fortunes were broad lies meant to scare and Isabel was not going to fall for it.

“Wait, what?” Isabel ripped her wrist out of the woman’s grasp and stood up. She slammed her hands on the table, loudly enough that her friends leaped in their seats. “What does that even mean?” She reached out and ripped Ed out of his chair, nodding for the rest of the club to follow her. Uncertainly, Isaac and Max looked to each-other and stood, careful to watch the old woman as they made their way to the entrance of the tent. Ed tugged at the collar of Cindy’s sweater, and he hardly had to pull twice for her to follow. Isabel dug deep into her pocket and tossed all of the nickels and dimes she had, tossing them at the fortune teller. She wasn’t going to see if that was how much they owed her. She just really wanted to throw loose change at the woman. Maybe she’d hit her eyes. “Buy yourself a chocolate bar, ya creep! We’re out of here!”

*********

Even if Isaac knew the fortune was fake- even if he knew it didn’t really mean anything- the old woman said so much that made sense. Cindy’s love life was dead; she hadn’t dated anyone since her cousin in seventh grade, which everyone but Ed still thought was hilarious. She seemed to be holding on to some odd, disturbing hope that she and Ed would get back together, but it wasn’t happening and they all knew it. He wasn’t sure if she knew she was still hung up on him. That could have been where the problem lied, actually. Ed’s fortune made just as much sense. Ed usually ended up picking fights on accident with large and small guys alike, not excluding small children with toy swords (which was a fun story). It would be no surprise if Ed managed to get his face beat in for it. With the number of times he’d nearly gotten them killed because he said the wrong thing to the wrong spirit, Isaac would have said that his fortune was pretty accurate. Isabel, well that one he was at a loss with. That fortune was even vaguer than the ones they’d all been dealt. It could, theoretically, fit her, but he wasn’t sure how. Isabel wasn’t the type to go fraternizing with a bad boy or anyone of the sort. Then again, it did say she would be an unwilling participant.

Max’s fortune and his own fortune seemed to fall together in a way Isaac was hoping their fates never would. Max was the last person he wanted to hurt- the last person he’d ever even consider shooting lightning at, yet somehow he was going to. If I listen to the fortune teller. She’s a fake. It’s a scam. Weather metaphors are pretty common! It doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with me. The fortune was stupid and it didn’t mean anything. But what if she was right? What if she was a real psychic? What then? Well, Isaac would just have to avoid shooting lightning around Max at all. He couldn’t shock his friend if he wasn’t shocking anything!

No matter how many times Isaac thought that, he still kept his distance from Max and stood on the other end of the straight line their friends had made. Max didn’t seem to notice and, if he did, he was too entertained by the daredevil to care. They’d shown up early enough to stand at the front of the gate, where they could see everything the daredevil did, whether it be riding his bike whilst doing a handstand or riding only on the handlebars.

It was obvious, at least to Isaac, that the gloominess of their fortunes still hung above everyone. Ed watched the show with a smile on his face, but it wasn’t ear-to-ear like it usually would have been. He seemed abnormally tense at his shoulders, as though he was waiting for something to make a leap at his back while he wasn’t looking. Isabel’s cheeks were bright pink, and she was trying to hide it behind her coat. The clearest sign was that she kept fixing her hair so that it was in her face, which she hated. It was why she always carried around an extra hair tie. He knew she was embarrassed and perhaps a little nervous about her future. Her hands twitched at her sides, and he wasn’t sure if it was out of desperation to just get home, or something else. Cindy was the most obvious, wiping her eyes periodically then clapping frantically seconds after everyone else had finished clapping. Isaac spared a glance at Max, but quickly turned his gaze to the fence in front of him.

He didn’t notice the stuntman waving at the audience as he prepared to board his bike once more, standing on a ramp that stood over a large shark tank. He threw his arms in the air, all smiles because it was probably his dream job and probably the most fun he’d ever had. His brown hair blew in the wind, right into his face, but he didn’t seem to care. It most likely wasn’t as annoying as the heavy makeup he was wearing around his eyes. He had a charisma about him that commanded attention from everyone but the ever-brooding Isaac. The daredevil loved his crowd, apparently more than he loved his life. The masses around him gasped in awe and clapped and whistled, cheering for him and deafeningly offering encouraging words. Well, they did, until his motorcycle started on its own and left him standing at the top of the ramp as it backed away. The daredevil twisted around, his voice catching in his throat. “Oh, shit! Kid, watch out!”

It wasn’t until Isaac saw the bright headlights of the motorcycle charging at him that he realized just what his fortune meant. As it grew closer, it sped up so fast the audience could hardly see it moving. Isaac backed away from the fences as fast as he could, pardoning himself with every person he pushed out of the way. Person after person, he shoved and backed further away. People at the front where he originally stood began screaming and parting for the motorcycle to pass through. Isaac could make out Ed’s and Isabel’s shapes in the distance, arms extended to keep the people behind them at bay. They watched the haunted motorcycle cautiously, waiting for it to make a move. It had slowed to sit behind the fence, but it still reared its engine at Isaac, who briefly fell on his behind when there was nobody left behind him. Isabel and Ed turned to yell at him, probably trying to help him, but he couldn’t hear a word they were saying over the booming voices of the crowd. The remaining audience that hadn’t run away glanced to their neighbors and chattered noisily about what was happening, questioning if it was all a stunt or a genuine technical error. Isaac himself was beginning to wonder if that was the case.

The motorcycle paused then began backing up, much to Isaac’s confusion. The bike followed the path up to the ramp, coming to sit within an inch of the daredevil’s hands. Warily, the professional reached out and gripped the handle, exhaling and waving to the crowd when the bike was steady at his touch. “It’s alright, everyone! I’m not sure what happened but it’s-!” The bike revved up for half a moment and ran right back down the ramp. The stuntman held on for what must have been five seconds, his face and body dragging along the ramp until he finally let go. When he did, he didn’t move. His body was still against the polished wooden ramp, and there were screams for a doctor. Nobody picked up their phone to call anyone, though, panicking at the motionless body before them. The motorcycle jumped the shark tank on its own, leaving the crowd both puzzled and terrified. The bike made it well over the tank, jumping over the fence and into the audience. Nobody was hurt, as the crowd had seen it coming and dispersed accordingly like the terrified helpless citizens they were. Isaac screeched and leaped back up to his feet, doing his best Naruto run away from the possessed motorcycle of death. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do, but it had to be away from non-spectrals and it had to be quick.

*********

“Oh my god,” Max ran his hands over his face. Of all of the sentient objects at a festival that could have attacked Isaac, it had to be a motorcycle. It couldn’t have been an adorable stuffed animal or a hammer from that one game, but a motorcycle. He was beginning to think Isaac was this unlucky all of the time. Either that or he was Isaac’s unluckiest friend and the medium should really stop taking him places.

“Max, you’ve got magnet powers! See if you can do anything about that bike.” Isabel pointed at Max then pointed vehemently at the parking lot where Isaac had lured away the possessed vehicle. “Ed and Cindy and I are going to keep everyone here from leaving the festival! That should buy you guys some time.” Max was headed for the parking lot before Isabel could finish what she was saying. If he was the only one who could help Isaac, then he was going to help him- and if ‘something’ happened as a result he wasn’t going to throw a fit. Oh, come on. He’s not gonna throw himself at you because you did your freaking job, you dork. Max rolled his eyes, a low hum of irritation with himself vibrating in his chest. Sometimes he was glad their freaky ghost powers didn’t come with mind-reading abilities.

Far ahead in the parking lot, there were bolts of lightning, none of which seemed to be hitting anything. It was odd that Isaac was too frightened to hit the four-hundred-pound bike that was literally coming straight at him, odd enough that Max was starting to wonder if the motorcycle was the only thing being controlled. Maybe the motorcycle was a distraction? Maybe there was some type of spirit toying with their emotions? Now that he thought about it, that made a lot of sense.

The closer he got, the more apparent it was that Isaac was struggling, playing a very deadly game of keep-away with his unfriendly motorbike. The medium was dodging with a series of huge gusts of wind and clouds filled with miniature lightning storms, missing every charge the bike made just scarcely. The bike swerved in circles that stained the street, riding at Isaac with speeds that were no question illegal. Max reached around to his backpack, which he resentfully carried with him everywhere because he had to, and pulled out his bat so fast he heard a sound straight out of a comic book. “Isaac, hold on! I’ve got this covered!”

Before he became a spectral, Max’s aim had always been good. He’d managed to hit Johnny with a can of tomato soup on his first day- on the first try. Sure that wasn’t something he’d ordinarily been able to accomplish, but he’d done it. In his time as a spectral and a not-so-proud member of the activity club, his aim had gotten even better. He could pelt Johnny with seven tomato soup cans on the way to school if he wanted to. Now, that wasn’t to say all of them would hit his head, but all of them would hit somewhere in the general area of his torso. Probably. He’d gotten great as using his tool, be it through communication and understanding with Scrap Dragon, or melee combat with a spirit (or spectral) that deserved to be knocked down a few pegs. When he pointed his bat at the motorcycle, all he could think about was how awesome it was that he could use his tool so effortlessly. He hardly had to think about using his magnet abilities before he got his wish. That was the problem with the situation. He was aiming his bat at a four-hundred-pound motorcycle and actively pulling it towards him. By the time he realized that, oh yes he wanted to move out of the way of an oncoming vehicle, he was way too slow.

“Oh god, Max!”

Isaac reached out to him, eyes wide with the worry he’d been feeling coming off of the medium in waves. A cloud filled with lightning hovered toward the bike before turning on its metaphorical heels and charging at Max, just as the motorcycle was. Max froze and watched as the threat of death and/or serious injury grew nearer and nearer.

*********

“Wow, uh,” Isabel shrugged and glanced around the entrance- the empty entrance where not a single soul dwelled with the intentions of leaving. “I guess this part of the job really wasn’t all that necessary, huh?”

“Should we go help…?” Cindy played with her fingers before pointing toward the parking lot, where there was a small explosion of lightning. The sound of a beeping car alarm resounded through the otherwise empty lot.

“Nah, I’m- I’m sure they’ve got this.”

Isabel placed her hands at her hips and watched the chaos continue, humming unsurely. There were a few more bursts of lightning and another car alarm started to go off. “On second thought, yeah, yeah they need help.” Ed came to stand beside Isabel, twirling his paintbrush in his fingers in one hand and sipping a soda in the other. Cindy glanced at the soda, then at Ed, and frowned. He shrugged his shoulders at his cousin and smiled. 

“What?”

“Eddy, this is serious. Maybe you should put your drink away.”

“This is very serious and that is why I have a drink.”

“Eddy.”

“Fine.”

Ed unenthusiastically tossed his soda blindly behind him, complaining as noisily as he could. He flew into mumbling about how he just wasted a perfectly good soda, and how the squirrels weren’t going to be able to take that amount of sugar and, because of Cindy, they’d deal with squirrels ironically destroying the tree festival. Cindy grumbled about how silly he was being and Isabel pulled both of them along into the parking lot. They didn’t seem to notice that Ed’s soda hit one of the prize shelves of a water balloon game, nor the superhero action figure that seemed to grow red in the face.

*********

Max glanced down at the burn on his arm, wincing when he poked at it. Rubbing the mark was only going to make it worse, if lightly tapping it was any indication. It was funny. He’d nearly grabbed a bottle of water that morning before he followed the club to the festival. That probably would have come in handy. Isaac was bending over him, out of breath from either tackling Max out of the way of the bike, or from the panic he was doing a horrible job at hiding.

“Max, oh my gosh! I’m so sorry!” He glanced at the ginger from the side, waiting patiently for a moment of silence that he figured would never come. Isaac reached for his hurt arm, but pulled away. Then he reached for Max’s shoulder, but pulled back again. He bit his lip and settled for shooting lightning near the motorcycle, just enough to send it steering off in the wrong direction. With the distraction, Isaac wrapped his arms under Max’s pits and pulled him behind the safety of a car. Max made sure Isaac wasn’t the only one putting in effort, pushing off the floor with his feet and crawling backwards where his friend dragged him. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think- I wasn’t thinking! Oh my god, I’m so sorry-!”

“Isaac!”

Max snapped his fingers in front of his friend’s face, waving his hand before slapping his forehead. Isaac blinked and shook himself out of his alarm, making steady eye-contact with Max as a sign he was listening. Max sighed and pulled the sleeve of his jacket back over the burnt skin of his arm. That way, Isaac wouldn’t look at it.  
“Listen, there was something fishy about that old lady and I think we fell for whatever plan she had bouncing around in that overly-sized head of hers.”

“What? She was just a fortune teller, Max-!”

“No, she wasn’t.” Max rubbed the back of his neck and glanced around the side of the car to check on the motorcycle. “At least, I don’t think so.” It was slowly backing away from a tree it’d run into, headlights blinking on and off as though it was communicating dizziness. Max quickly ducked his head behind the car again, upon which he noticed was a bumper sticker of a woman, man, and twelve dogs. He suddenly felt horrible about borrowing and possibly destroying that specific car in a life-threatening game of hide-and-seek. When he turned back to Isaac, he was on his knees with his fingers dancing rapidly at his lap. “Listen, you’re scared because that fortune is in your head. You think that motorcycle is supposed to hurt you, right?” Isaac nodded and opened his mouth to say something, but Max covered his lips with his hand. “Her exact words were something about you being put in pain that you might have indirectly caused, right?” Isaac nodded again. “But you’re already in pain, aren’t you? Because you hurt my arm?” Isaac was unresponsive for a short time, eyes falling from Max to the ground. Eventually he nodded again. “Well, doesn’t that mean your fortune’s come true? Doesn’t that mean mine has?” Isaac’s eyes widened and Max could feel him smile under his hand.

When Isaac nodded again, Max let his hand fall. Isaac caught it in his own and squeezed his fingers. The result was just as electrifying as Max thought it would be. Heat ran under his skin, all along his arms so every hair was raised. If Isaac noticed the pinkness in his cheeks, he said nothing. Of course, Max bet it was because he saw Isaac’s face burning too. “Right, so we have a chance at taking this thing down, now!” Max bit back the obvious reply, which was you’ve always had a chance- it was all in your head, and squeezed Isaac’s hand back.

“You ready to do this?”

“Heck yeah.”

*********

“Well, you certainly picked a fight with the wrong man- the wrong superman, apparently.”

“Cindy that is not funny!” Ed leaped another shot from the action figure’s laser eyes, feeling a lot like a dancing monkey. All he needed was the cymbals and the fez and he’d kill a street performance. Isabel followed close behind the two, taking spectral shots when she thought she had a ghost of a chance at hitting the damn thing. It was too small and it moved too fast. If she was going to hit it, she needed it to stop moving. Regrettably, that meant Ed had to stop moving. She didn’t want him to do that. “Seriously, what could I have possibly done to enrage the almighty man of steel? Please tell me!” Ed very narrowly missed another set of laser beams, landing on one heel and flailing his arms to balance himself again. “I mean, I might have let Isabel take off Louis’s head when we were kids, and I’m sorry for that, but a Barbie with a GI-Joe head was just so funny, you know?”

“Eddy,” Cindy jumped at the action figure, one of her knives at the ready “I know you’re being sincere but it’s coming off as mockery and we’re going to need you to stop talking.” Her swipe missed, and she landed face-first in the grass with a heap of dirt in her mouth. Cindy gagged and spit it all into her hands, mumbling something about swallowing a worm.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Cindy!” Ed ducked to avoid yet another laser beam. “Would you like my hips to not lie, instead? My mouth is trying its best here!”

“Ed, seriously, shut up for like two seconds so we can actually hit this thing.” Isabel took another shot at the superman-figure-gone-sentient. The shot came close, but it was nowhere near close enough. The action figure turned to her, its eyes lighting up. For once, Isabel could see how intimidating a red aura must have been. Still, she had its attention off of Ed, and that meant she had a chance to hit it. The red grew increasingly more menacing with each second, and Isabel backed away slowly, hand searching desperately behind her for a tree to bounce off of. When she found none, she figured she’d have to improvise. She bent down to ground level, pressing her hands against the green grass. It was wet, with the season and all, and slippery, but she could make it work. Just as the beams went off, Isabel leaped forward, only to be tackled from several feet away by an oblivious Max who was only trying to help. A quick shot of lightning all but obliterated the action figure, and Isaac seemed overjoyed by his triumph. He was so overjoyed, in fact, that he stomped on the ashes of the action figure and screamed obscenities at the psychic (who was nowhere around, so the sky- he was yelling at the sky). Ed grabbed Isaac’s hands and danced around in a circle with him, laughing and generally being his regular giddy self. Cindy leaped up and down, repeating a mantra of ‘woo hoo’ and ‘boo yah’. (“How did you guys stop that motorcycle, B. T. dubs?” Ed asked. “Oh, I stood on Max’s shoulders, he pulled the motorcycle at us so I could aim properly, and I shot it! I’m surprised you didn’t hear the explosion, actually. It was a nice bike. It’s sad that it had to go- but the blast was beautiful!”)

It was a lovely moment that lasted all of five seconds before they realized Max and Isabel were kissing.

It certainly wasn’t intentional on his part, and even more so not on hers, but both took a long time to process the situation. They sat there with their lips locked, openly staring back at each-other and blinking what must have been morse code for all of the questions they were thinking. Max blinked a very clear ‘what’ and Isabel matched him by blinking a very clear ‘why’. After thirty seconds of very silent, very awkward lip-locking, Max shifted away so that he was sitting up on his knees. He held his hands up defensively and Isabel took the opportunity to scoot out from under him. They continued their staring contest, both of them squinting and repeatedly opening their mouths.

“Oh,” Cindy nodded and smiled, snickering to herself “I get it. Unwillingly ‘involved’ with the wrong boy. Right.”

Max must have finally started to catch up to what had happened, because his face began to turn a very deep scarlet red. He made a low guttural noise and dropped his hands to his sides. Isabel turned her stern gaze to her legs, feeling angry and embarrassed and concerned about everything she could think of at the moment. “Well, uh-!” Max yelped as the back of his hoodie was tugged by a firm hand, firm enough that it kind of choked him. His hands reached up to fight back until he felt the electricity cracking at his touch. The batter looked up at Isaac, intending to say something snarky and undoubtedly offensive, but the words died in his throat. Isaac’s aura was positively smoldering, and his narrowed eyes had a look about them Isabel hadn’t been expecting to see. The medium exhaled through his nose, steam pouring out of his nostrils.

“Get up. I think we’re all done with the festival for today.”

Isabel sat up and bent her legs to stand, pressing her palms against the dirt under her fingers. It’d been uncomfortable before, but she was feeling a more potent form of discomfort. When she felt hands on her arms, she didn’t struggle, not when she saw the tell-tale green sleeves. He helped her to her feet, one arm wrapped securely around her waist while the other pressed against her back to push her up. “Thanks, Ed.”

“Yeah.”

She jerked, put off by his tone. He kept his voice level and pitched as usual, but his aura was no smaller than Isaac’s was, extending well over the height of his body. The hands that helped her up were gentle, but she could tell that was because she wasn't the target of his hostility. When she finally came to stand at her feet, he stuck his hands in his pockets and headed straight for the exit of the festival grounds. Isaac wasn’t far behind him, once he’d helped (roughly assisted by the bottoms of the batter’s arms) Max to stand. The two fumed silently next to each-other, Isaac offering Ed a pat on the shoulder, Ed patting Isaac on the head. It was funny to see, really. Ed was still pretty short for a high-schooler; Isaac stood an inch or three above him. It was like watching a kid trying to reach the top shelf. Cindy was the first to go after them, locking her arms through both of theirs and taking their hands. Her cheerful disposition managed to put out some of the spectral flames, but the fires still lingered like a spark above their skin.

“We should probably, uh, follow them.” Max took his cap off to run a hand through his hair. He’d kept it short over the years, but it’d still grown more than he would have liked. Everyone (Isaac) told him his hat looked better on him with longer hair, though, so he figured it didn’t bother him too much. Isabel shrugged and carried on after their friends without a word.

*********

Running into Mister Spender was the absolute last thing any of them needed. They all just wanted to go home and forget the night had ever happened, because superhero action figures should never come alive and shoot at undeserving civilians and motorcycles shouldn’t drive by themselves. Isaac was already swearing off fortune tellers and Ed was contemplating what to write on his will, because he had a hunch he’d be put in a similar situation again. Their auras had calmed down along the way, but it was abundantly clear they wanted to avoid conversation. Spender was walking out of the fortune teller’s tent with another consortium agent at his side, talking very seriously about the possibility of the consortium purchasing a possessed hamster as a pet. The agent was very avid about them purchasing said rodent, and Spender was reminding them with a grave frown that they’d have to purchase the hamster and then get it possessed and it was “just so much work”.

“Mister Spender?”

The teacher’s face lit up upon the arrival of his students, a smile stretching across his face. “Ah, children! I’m afraid if you’re looking to get your fortune read, you’ll have to find someone else. I would have suggested it anyway.”

“Wait, why?” Isaac tried to look around Spender, but the teacher stepped everywhere Isaac tried to get a good look inside the tent. While Isaac had grown taller, Spender still had a good five inches on him. The medium huffed and crossed his arms, sneering whenever the two made eye-contact.

“Well, there’s not a lot I can say-!”

“We already had our fortunes read, though.” Isabel pointed to the powder still clinging to her strings of hair. It still smelled like ginger, and that was great, but she just knew she’d have a hard time washing all of it off later. Spender bounded to wiping the residue off of his students, grasping them by their shoulders and ruffling their hair and shaking their clothes down. Max got the worst of it, having Spender grab him by the ankles and shake him upside down (“OH MY GOD WHY?!”).

When he was finally finished frantically making his students disoriented and annoyed, Spender stood up straight and flattened his tie. “Apologies, children. Those weren’t fortunes that she read. They were curses- of sorts. That woman was the medium of a very malevolent spirit, one that got its kicks by stirring up trouble amongst naïve spectrals. This powder is her way of following you, keeping her eyes on you so she knows what inanimate objects to control.”

“She must have noticed my tool earlier.” Ed glanced down at his paintbrush, which sat idly in his pocket. The elderly woman had been staring at himself and Isaac and Max for an uncomfortably long time. In hindsight, they should have known there was something wrong with the situation. Honestly, he didn’t know why they hadn’t left after the first two horrible fortunes. Sure would have saved them a lot of exercise.

The kids were silent, glancing at one another and shifting on their heels every so often. Spender frowned at the interaction, whatever confidence he had in his demeanor fading. “Let me guess, you’ve already dealt with your fortunes.”  
“Unfortunately! Eh?” Max elbowed Isaac, who offered little more response than a scowl. Max continued elbowing him, repeating ‘eh’ over and over until he finally saw a smile cracking. “Eh, he gets it.” Isaac laughed and shook his head, grasping Max’s face in the palm of his hand and shoving him away.

*********

“Oh, come on guys! Please! These things are notorious for giving out good fortunes!”

“Cindy, are you serious right now?” Isabel motioned wildly from Cindy, who stood with her hands clasped together with the biggest eyes she could muster, to the fortune teller machine. It was one of the old eerie ones from the movies that looked like it would open its mouth and spew oil or blood. It had big, bulging eyes and a mechanical chin that opened and closed with a steel jaw. It was talking, or trying to. “Are you asking to be attacked by hundred-pound machine with that face?”

“Please, guys? If this machine was dangerous, don’t you think your teacher would have taken care of it, too?”

“No, no I do not.” Isaac crossed his arms. Cindy bowed to the club, batting her overly large eyes and worrying her lips.

“Guys, come on. Just one fortune and we can leave. Please?”

Ed rubbed the bridge of his nose, barred his teeth, and hissed “I’ll do it.”

When Ed broke down to make the sacrifice for his friends, they complied for his sake and got fortunes of their own. Ed was the first one to slip a nickel into the machine and, after a short discussion about everybody reading their fortunes at the same time, took his fortune in his hand and stepped away. Max was up next, slipping his own nickel in and receiving his own fortune. It continued on like that until the entire club had their own slips of paper, Isaac after Max, Isabel after Isaac, and Cindy after Isabel. They stood in a circle, each holding their fortunes in front of them. “Okay, Ed. What does yours say?”

“Um,” he glanced down at the slip of paper, and for a moment he was disbelieving of the words he was reading. He looked up to see his friend’s eager faces and felt his cheeks grow warm. His fortune was more personal than he would have liked, but he guessed he could play it off like it made no sense- even though it did. It made a lot of sense and it kind of scared him. “Don’t be afraid to,” he swallowed “be forward. She likes that.” Of course it was a generic robot fortune shtick. He knew that. He also knew it was right and he probably should take its advice, but he wouldn’t because it’s a randomized fortune from a rusty machine. “Max?”

Max glanced down at his fortune, cocking a skeptical eyebrow until he finished reading it a few times. It took a while for the words on the slip of paper to register, but when they did he was only more confused than he had been. He was suddenly reconsidering his decision to be a part of this. There were lots of other things he could have been doing, like reenacting the Darth Vader vs Luke battle with some fake lightsabers or, well, homework. “You know what? I just decided I’m too cool to be doing something like this, so I’m gonna start heading home.”

“Max, read your freaking fortune.” Isabel gripped the back of his hoodie and pulled him back into the circle- back into his own personal prison.

He cleared his throat into his fist, glancing at Isaac who was looking awfully interested in his own fortune, interested enough to not pay attention to his. “Sometimes the best things come in the worst moments. Don’t second-guess others.”

Ed blinked and tilted his head. “Wow that was incredibly vague and confusing.”

“Right?”

“Um, can I just not share?” Isaac tugged at the collar of his shirt, sweating even in the cold of fall.

“No, spill your heart. Submit to your peers. Be one with your shame.”

Cindy clicked her tongue at Max, who did little else but shrug her off.

Isaac sighed. He’d been dreading sharing his fortune since he’d read the first word. It was too close to him to openly share with everyone, but he guessed it was only fair. After all, Ed and Max hadn’t seemed to want to share theirs. If he didn’t, it would ruin the fun of it all. Besides, it wasn’t like the fortune was real. Right? “You know what’s yours. Take it and nurture it.” When he looked up, he found Max’s eyes on him with a concentration he’d seen rarely in his friend. It sent familiar shivers down his spine and set a fire in his chest, but as usual it was nothing unpleasant. In fact, Isaac enjoyed the feeling. It wasn’t as though he had to be embarrassed. Max was, after all, just as bright in the cheeks as he was. The two hardly noticed when they inched close enough that their arms and shoulders were brushing together. “Isabel? You’re up.”

“Um,” Isabel hadn’t read her fortune yet, even though she probably should have. “You’re the only one, and you know it.” She arched her eyebrow, but otherwise didn’t have much of a reaction. It was oddly unfitting where everyone else’s seemed to fit into some context. She guessed it was supposed to tell the future, but it was still somewhat disappointing to read a fortune she couldn’t relate to. She shrugged and looked to Cindy, who was looking giddier every second. She gave her a smile and nodded for her to go.

Cindy squeaked and opened up her fortune for what was probably the first time, because her face fell as soon as she read it and she crumpled the paper up and ate it. “Stupid fortunes” she muttered “don’t mean anything anyway.”

“Gosh, Cindy” Isaac and Ed were somewhere between laughing and looking empathetic, cheeks inflated with the giggles they were trying to hide. “What did it say?”

Through thin lips, she mumbled. “He’s out there somewhere. Keep looking.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternatively known as your obligatory PSA about evil spirits possessing old women and using them to curse unknowing spectrals.


End file.
